Instructors:

• Carl Ernst cernst@email.unc.edu101 Saunders Hall
• James Peacock peacock@unc.edu 306A Alumni building

Web: http://www.unc.edu/%7Ecernst/courses/pre2000fall/reli199
Links on Islam

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

Globalization is often described in terms of worldwide capitalism: "Dollars go round the world and dollars make the world go round" (Doreen Massie). There are political, cultural, technological, and psychological dimensions to this process, too, and religion is critical for establishing ethical standards. In fact, two large counter-forces in globalism are economics and religion, each sometimes vying for domination in different ways.

This seminar addresses globalization as a multi-societal process while focusing on Islam especially as experienced in various Asian locales (e.g. Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, India and Indonesia). Theoretical arguments will be juxtaposed with detailed case studies (for example, the Rushdie affair, Huntington’s "Clash of Civilizations" debate) or particular topics (Sufism, Islamic fundamentalism, Orientalism, print capitalism). Issues will include cultural and ideological conflicts, Islam and Gender, anthropology of Islam, Islam as discursive practice, Islamic nationalism and transnationalism, and Islam and violence.

This is an interactive course that mixes lectures by instructors and guest lecturers with class discussions and student presentations.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS:

Class Discussions:

Students have to actively engage and participate in class discussions, and prepare discussion questions in pairs to lead the rest of the class for each discussion session.

Class Presentations:

Each student will share his or her final paper project as a 20-minute work in progress class presentation.

Reports:

Students will prepare three reports. Each should be typed and double-spaced. The reports should be between three to five pages long. The first report is a critical overview of one of the assigned books. The second is a report on an event that relates to Islam. This could be a lecture, a performance, a ritual or a museum exhibit. The third report is an evaluation of an Islamic Internet site using some of the concepts we discuss in the class. Student may conduct interviews on the Internet.

Final Paper:

Students are required to write a term paper treating a particular issue or case study. Papers should be typed in double space and no less than 15 pages.
 
 

Grading:

• Final Paper: 50 %
• Class Presentation: 10 %
• Book report: 5 %
• Event report: 5 %
• Internet Project: 10 %
• Class Participation and attendance 20 %

CLASS SCHEDULE:
 
 

1. R Jan. 13 Introduction

Distribute reading assignments.
Short essay: What do expect to learn in this course?
Introducing research topics.
Notes

2. T Jan. 18* Globalization and religion

Discussion questions
Readings: Beyer’s "Introduction: Religion in Global Society," pp.1-13 and "Four Approaches to Globalization," pp. 14-44.

Readings:

Discussion readings: Beyer’s "Socio-culrural Particularism in a Global Society," pp. 45-69, "Systemic Religion in Global Society," pp. 70-96 and "Religion and Social Movements in Global Society," pp. 97-110.

Readings: Ernst’s "The Study of Religion, the Study of Islam."

Discussion questions
Readings: Appadurai’s "Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy" and "The Production of Locality."
Lawrence’s "Islam across Time and Cultures," from Shattering the Myth, pp. 3-31.
Notes

Discussion questions
Readings: Asad’s The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam.
Starret’s "The Anthropology of Islam."

Readings: Ernst’s "Sufism and the Contemporary World."

Readings: Ernst and Lawrence, BURNT HEARTS:THE CHISHTI SUFI ORDER IN SOUTH ASIA AND BEYOND, Introduction, Chapter 1 (pre-publication version)

Discussion readings: Lawrence’s "The Three phases of Modern-Day Islam," and "Islamic Reform: Secular Nationalism," pp. 32-51.
Discussion Questions (Elizabeth Cox)

Discussion Questions (Elizabeth Cox)
readings: Johnson’s "Islam in Contemporary Palestinian Nationalism."

Reading: "New Technologies, Old Culture: A Look at Women, Gender and the Internet in Kuwait" (password needed)

13. R Feb. 24 Transnationalism in Islam

Discussion readings: Eickelman’s and Piscatori’s "Muslim Politics: A Changing Political Geography."
Anderson’s "The Internet and Islam’s New Interpreters"
Notes

Readings: Robinson, Francis. "Islam and the Impact of Print in South Asia," in Nigel Crook, ed., The Transmission of Learning in South Asia (Delhi: OUP, 1996), pp. 62-97.

Readings: Ahmed’s "Women and the Rise of Islam," pp.41-63 (Elisabeth Marie), "The Transitional Age," pp. 64-78 (Kristine Sofiano) and "Elaboration of the Founding Discourse," pp. 79-101 (Samia Serageldin).
Questions:

Discussion Questions (Alyce Miller)
readings: Kandiyoti’s "Islam and Patriarchy"

Discussion Questions
Readings: Ahmed’s "Medieval Islam," pp. 102-23 (Mary Bratsch),"Social and Intellectual Change," pp. 127-43 (Michal Osterweil) and "The Discourse of the Veil," pp.144-167 (Durba Chatterji).

SPRING BREAK

18. T Mar. 21* The Rushdie affair as a global issue

Discussion Questions (Rye Barcott)
Readings: Fisher’s "Postscriptural Parergon"
Rushdie’s Satanic Verses, selections, pp.

Discussion questions (Michal Osterweil)
Readings: Asad’s "MultiCulturalism and British Identity in the Wake of Rushdie Affair," and "Ethnography, Literature, and Politics.

Discussion Readings: Lawrence’s "Islamic Fundamentalism: Religious Nationalism," pp. 51-105 and "Fundamentalism as Religious Ideology in Multiple Contexts."
Eickelman‘s & Piscatori’s "Protest and Bargaining in Muslim Politics,"
Abstracts of research topics due
Notes

22. T Apr. 4 Catch-up day

Presentation 1: Rye Barcott

Readings: Peacock’s "Indonesia," pp. 15-26 and
Woodward’s "Talking across Paradigms: Indonesia, Islam and Orientalism." Not photocopied

Reading: Peacock’s "Darol Arqom: A Muhammadiyah Training Camp," and "Muhammadiyah," pp. 79-111.
Guest lecturer: Ida Adi
Third Paper (Internet) due
Presentation 2: Elisabeth Marie

25. R Apr. 13 The Muhammadiyah movement in Indonesia (continued)
        Presentation 3: Michal Osterweil

26. T Apr. 18 Presentations 4, 5: Miranda Smith, Rosallah Muhammad,

drafts of final papers due

28. T Apr. 25 Student Presentations

Presentations 6, 7, 8: Durba Chatterji, Kristine Soriano, Mary Bratsch
Teleconference link with Emory

Discussion Readings (Rosallah and Miranda): Huntington’s "The Clash of Civilizations?" and "Response: If Not Civilizations, What?"
Bartley’s "The Case for Optimism."
Ajami’s "The Summoning."
Presentation 9: Korie Baldwin
Julie Flowerday presents views of Hunza
Huntington’s replies.

Discussion Questions: Elisabeth Marie
Readings: Said’s "Orientalism Reconsidered"
Turner’s "Politics and Culture in Islamic Globalism"
Presentation 10: Elizabeth

31. R May 4 Conclusion: Orientalism and Globalism

Readings: Turner’s "From Orientalism to global sociology" and "The concept of the World"
Presentation 11: Henry
Final Papers due

*Carl Ernst gone Jan. 14-23 to The Eighth East West Philosophers' Conference at the University of Hawaii, and March 2-20

*Jim Peacock gone March 4-20 to the American University in Cairo

Assign students in pairs to come up with questions in advance each week to guide discussion

1^st 30 minutes

20 presentations by students plus 3 by us, loosely tied to weekly topics

(possible spring workshop at Duke in spring on Indonesia)

Speakers: Ulf Hannerz (Stockholm), Bruce Lawrence, Charlie Kurzman, S. Gh. Safavi
 
 

Extra lectures:

Islamization of Knowledge: the case of Islamic economics (is there a distinctively Islamic economics?)

Readings: look for Timur Koran? In index islamica
 
 
 
 

CLASS READING

Available for purchase at the Ram Bookshop:

Arjun Appadurai, "Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy," pp. 27-47 and "The Production of Locality," pp. 178-200. In: Modernity at Large Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998.

Deniz Kandiyoti, "Islam and Patriarchy: a Comparative Perspective." In: Nikki Keddie and Beth Baron (eds.) Women in Middle Eastern History: Shifting Boundaries in Sex and Gender, pp.23-42. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1991.

Aihwa Ong, "State Versus Islam: Malay Families, Women’s Bodies and the Body Politics in Malaysia," American Ethnologist 17(2): 258-76, 1990

Edward Said, "Orientalism Reconsidered." In: The Contemporary Study of the Arab World, Earl Sullivan and Jacqueline Ismael (eds.), pp. 35-50. Manitoba: University of Alberta Press, 1991.

Gregory Starrett,"The Anthropology of Islam." In: Anthropology of Religion: a Handbook, Stephen Glazier (ed.), pp. 279-303. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1997.

Bruce Lawrence, "Fundamentalism as Religious Ideology in Multiple Contexts." In: Defenders of God: The Fundamentalist Revolt Against the Modern Age, pp. 90-101. New York: Harper and Row.

James Peacock, The Muhammadijah in Indonesian Islam. Program in Southeast Asian Studies, ASU, 1978; reprint 1992.

Michael Fisher and Mehdi Abedi, "Postscriptural Parergon: Bombay Talkies, the Word and the World: Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses." In: Debating Muslims: Cultural Dialoques in Postmodernity and Tradition, pp. 383-442. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1990.

Talal Asad, "MultiCulturalism and British Identity in the Wake of Rushdie Affair," and " Ethnography Literature, and Politics." In: Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam, pp. 239-306. Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press,1993.

Bryan Turner, Orientalism, Postmodernism, and Globalism, Selections, pp. 77-114. London and New York: Routledge, 1994.

Carl Ernst, "Sufism and the Contemporary World." In: The Shambhala Guide to Sufism, pp. 199-228. Boston and London: Shambhala, 1997.

Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori "Protest and Bargaining in Muslim Politics," and "Muslim Politics: A Changing Political Geography." In Muslim Politics, pp. 108-162. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996.

Mark Woodward, "Talking across Paradigms: Indonesia, Islam and Orientalism." In: Toward a New Paradigm: Recent Developments in Indonesian Islam Thought, pp.1-45. Tempe: Arizona State University.

Jon W. Anderson, "The Internet and Islam’s New Interpreters." In: New Media in the Muslim World: The Emerging Public Sphere, Eickelman and Anderson (eds.), pp. 41-56. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.

Carl Ernst "The Study of Religion, the Study of Islam." Unpublished paper.

Nels Johnson, "Islam in Contemporary Palestinian Nationalism," in: Islam and the Politics of Meaning in Palestinian Nationalism, pp. 59-95. London: Kegan Paul, 1982.

Ulf Hannerz, Cosmopolitans and Locals in World Culture". In: Global Culture: Nationalism, Globalization and Modernity. Mike Featherstone (ed.), pp. 237-251. London: Sage, 1990.

Samuel Huntington, "The Clash of Civilizations?" Foreign Affairs (72) 3:22-49, 1993.

Samuel Huntington, "Response: If Not Civilizations, What? Paradigms of the Post-Cold War World," Foreign Affairs (72) 5: 186-194, 1993.

Kishore Mahbubani, "The Dangers of Decadence: What the Rest Teach the West." Foreign Affairs (72) 4: 10-14, 1993.

Robert Bartley, "The Case for Optimism: The West Should Believe in Itself," Foreign Affairs (72) 4: 15-18, 1993.

Fouad Ajami, "The Summoning," Foreign Affairs (72) 4:2-9, 1993.